Coach Leavitt "We're not there yet"

Coach Jim Leavitt adresses the media after the Bulls 31-10 loss to Miami. See what coach has to say about the team's performance in the tough home loss at Raymond James Stadium.

The Bulls suffered another tough home loss to Miami Saturday, 31-10. After the game USF Head Coach Jim Leavitt addressrd the media after the the loss to the Canes at Raymond James Stadium.

USF Head Coach Jim Leavitt:

Opening Statement
"They beat us on the line of scrimmage pretty good. Part of it, we've got to keep recruiting, no question. You all saw that. They've got some pretty good players but we should have played better. They're a very good football team. Miami's a very good football team and they just beat us. They beat us on the line of scrimmage as much as anything; on the offensive and defensive lines. And you know, when it's 21-10, at least we were kind of making a move. Our defense didn't play good enough and our line of scrimmage on defense got whooped, really got whooped. But we've got to do some things offensively as well. I mean they beat us both sides, you know. Kicking game was okay except for Delbert didn't hit his punts very good. We had the first kickoff return that was decent. But you know, they're just a better football team. And they showed it, they're very well coached.

They're a very good team. And we had turnovers, can't have turnovers, that's for sure. And we had a number of those. We got a very young football team and our day will come. We beat Florida State earlier and we lost to Miami. We've got UConn coming up. Some guys played very hard tonight, I saw that. We've got a lot of guys banged up as you saw. We had some struggles on the kicking game. We lost at least four or five guys. When you lose four or five guys it's hard to be deep enough to get everybody out there. We really were thin at the end of the game. A lot of guys got banged up."

On B.J.'s game tonight...
"I got to watch film and see. You have to protect the football. You know, you can't do that. But, one thing about B.J., he's a battler, he's a warrior, he fights, he tries. It's not all B.J. I got to look at film and just see. I thought he competed hard. During the game, there was some things we felt that were there. But you know, he's always going to compete. I'm sure he made mistakes here and there. But you know, there's a number of things, you got to wait and see. There's a number of things during the game that I know about. He's always a battler."

On if he was surprised of how well Miami ran the ball...
"I got to watch film and see. You have to protect the football. You know, you can't do that. But, one thing about B.J., he's a battler, he's a warrior, he fights, he tries. It's not all B.J. I got to look at film and just see. I thought he competed hard. During the game, there was some things we felt that were there. But you know, he's always going to compete. I'm sure he made mistakes here and there. But you know, there's a number of things, you got to wait and see. There's a number of things during the game that I know about. He's always a battler."

"Yeah, I knew they were pretty good running (team). That's where we're, we got to get better upfront. You know, one of our weaknesses is getting stout, big, physical people that can play inside. And we're just not that big and physical inside. I mean, I'm not trying to make excuses. I'm one who will never do that. But we haven't always recruited the same guys. And all those guys over there, we tried. And games like this don't help; well they might help a lot. They see that we have some needs. But we're not big and physical up inside. But the problem I have is maybe, were we high on some double teams. There are some things you can do even though you're maybe not as big and physical and strong. I'm anxious to look at the film and see. I saw them get quite a bit of movement on some double teams on some of our guys inside. I mean really moved them off the line. I don't know what else you're going to do there...""I got to watch film and see.

You have to protect the football. You know, you can't do that. But, one thing about B.J., he's a battler, he's a warrior, he fights, he tries. It's not all B.J. I got to look at film and just see. I thought he competed hard. During the game, there was some things we felt that were there. But you know, he's always going to compete. I'm sure he made mistakes here and there. But you know, there are a number of things, you got to wait and see. There's a number of things during the game that I know about. He's always a battler."